The role of physics in local government 2

Everything that happens in local government, as in any organisation, is determined by the people that work in it and all human activity is underpinned by our biology.  This is in turn dependent upon the thousands and millions of chemical reactions that take place in our bodies which in turn adhere to the fundamental laws of physics.  Nothing happens in local government therefore that is not underpinned by physics whether it is on the largest of scales or at the molecular or quantum level and it is to the latter that I turn my attention in this post.

Werner Karl Heisenberg, a German theoretical physicist (5 December 1901 to 1 February 1976) made significant progress in his chosen field. Everyone who mattered was certain of this, so certain that he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1932 for the creation of quantum mechanics.  He is probably best known however for his uncertainty principle which says that for certain pairs of physical properties of a particle there is a fundamental limit to the precision that can be known simultaneously.  So the more accurately we know the position of a particle the less certain we can be about its momentum.  The converse also holds true and is a fundamental property of quantum systems due to the wave nature of all objects at this scale (so I am led to believe).

Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle is often confused with another effect in physics in which measurements of systems cannot be made without having an effect on that system.  As an example if you want to measure the temperature of some water in a pan you will need to put in a thermometer, the temperature of which will either heat up or cool down the water.  This is known as the observer effect.

So what has this got to do with local government?  Two things really.  Firstly when trying to change behaviours in an organisation, especially by setting targets to make improvement the uncertainty principle will kick in.  A strong focus on achievement of a specific target will result in an unexpected rise in some other effect, usually detrimental to whatever you set out to change in the first place.  If you focus on the speed with which telephone calls are answered for example then the quality of calls may suffer as a consequence as operators are eager to move onto the next one in the queue.  If you’ve ever had a ghost call at home then you’ll know what I mean.  The more certain you are about achievement of a set target the more uncertain you will become about another aspect of the operation.

Secondly, the very act of measuring something will affect that measurement.  That may be what is wanted, after all what gets measured gets done but doing some analysis or setting out some metric will give a clear signal, intended or not that this is important and that the number needs to rise or fall.  Before measurement the issue wasn’t considered and after measurement it becomes of high importance.  Picking something which may well be meaningless to your business, such as the number of letters that are sent out will soon make sending letters a key focus for the employees and a self-perpetuating system will be developed to manage the measurement.

Choosing what to measure needs to be done with great care.  Whatever you decide upon, however well-intentioned and however well you try to avoid it, will have uncertain and observer induced consequences.  It is not something you set out to do, it’s just the laws of physics.